Breast cancer survivor recalls journey

Saturday

Beryl Packer was in her early 50s and went in for her regular visit. After the mammogram, the radiology technician asked to take some more images.

That had never happened before.

She got the call while she was at work: “You need to have a biopsy — you have breast cancer,” she was told.

That’s when she went to the restroom and began crying. Not usually an overly emotional person, a coworker asked “Are you OK?”

“No, I’m not” she responded, “but I will be.”

Packer was diagnosed with breast cancer 11 years ago. Shocked at the news, Packer and her husband Dave decided knowledge was the best defense. They spent a lot of time researching what may lie ahead in the breast cancer journey as well as options available at the time.

When she met with her surgeon, she had prepared questions. He wasn’t prepared to answer them.

She was told she would have a mastectomy and all her breast tissue would be removed. Packer had learned through her research that breast conservation surgeries were common. She shared the statistics with her doctor and asked him why she had to have a full mastectomy instead of a lumpectomy (the cancer, although aggressive, had not moved beyond her right breast).

“He was surprised,” she said. “Most people don’t question their physicians.”

The doctor was defensive, she said, so she decided to work with someone else.

Through a friend, she was able to find the best breast surgeon in Des Moines, Iowa, where they were living at the time. She asked him the same questions.

“He was phenomenal,” she said. “He answered every single question.”

Packer said she was lucky — she was had stage one breast cancer, a supportive family and a supportive workplace.

Forty-three grams of tissue were removed from her breast. Following the surgery, Packer also had radiation therapy, AC chemotherapy and a secondary treatment she discovered in her research, Taxol. Extracted from the bark of the Pacific yew tree, studies at the time showed a possible correlation between the secondary use of the drug and survival rates of patients with breast cancer. Although she did not participate in the study, she asked her doctor about it and if she could try it. He allowed it.

The Taxol had a side effect neuropathy, she said. She took it once a week for 12 weeks.

“I could feel it starting as a tingling and burning in my toes,” she said. “I almost quit because it was so painful.” But Packer decided that the current and future pain from the neuropathy was worth improving her chances of survival. Eleven years later, she still has pain and burning in her feet and it causes her to stumble sometimes, but she said it’s worth it if it helped give her any additional time.

Packer was open about her breast cancer with colleagues and those who approached her in public. She said that people would often come up to her and share their cancer stories and, although overwhelming at times, it helped her focus on something other than herself.

She continued to work through the whole process, she said.

When her hair began falling out, she tried wearing it in patches, she tried wigs and hats, but it wasn’t until she saw some motorcyclists wearing doo-rags that she found what worked for her. At the local Harley Davidson, she found an array of colors and styles for women and, most importantly, they were soft. She made the most of it and bought a variety from plain black to flame and tattoo designs.

“I’ll at least have fun with this,” she thought. What was worse than losing her hair, she said, was losing her eyebrows and eyelashes. In addition to the dirt she didn’t realize they protected her eyes from, Packer said that without them, no one recognized her.

“People didn’t know who I was,” she said. She never realized before how important those features were, she said.

The whole process was difficult, but she tried to remain positive and see the bright side of things.

“I’m just so thrilled to be alive,” Packer said.

When she was cancer free, she and Dave decided it was time to move to the place they had always planned: Eastern North Carolina, where they had vacationed for 30 years.

“Now I have my ocean fix every day,” Packer said.

Packer loves living here and even started a business in Cedar Point. They own the Molly Maid of the Crystal Coast franchise, earning the Business of the Year award at the Swansboro Area Chamber of Commerce’s Membership Banquet in June.

The whole experience taught her so much, she said, and has made her appreciate the people in her life and every day even more.

Packer’s mother is also a breast cancer survivor, and her mother-in-law was diagnosed in May.

Her advice is for women to take care of themselves and be their own health care advocates.

“I would be dead if I had gone two years without a mammogram,” she said, so getting checked regularly is important. She encourages people dealing with any medical issue to do their research and to ask questions.

“Insist on good care, insist on answers, insist on understanding,” Packer said.

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